He makes me feel like shit. Worse, he makes me feel wrong. Reminds me that what I’m doing with Katie, it’s wrong. Seeking her out, following her, even rescuing her at the park, I should’ve never interfered with her life. I walked away from her before and I should have stayed away.
I took my need to find her too far. I became obsessed. I am obsessed—with Katie. With seeing her, with the way she makes me feel, how my heart twists when she smiles, how her eyes light up when she looks at me. It’s all fucked up, a mixture of memories and fantasies, the past and now. I’ve made a mess of things. Like usual.
Like always.
Like my father.
The ultimate in taking it too far was meeting her for dinner, like we were on a real date or something. Making conversation, revealing little bits and pieces to each other, like we were strangers and how we met was completely random.
It’s all a lie. She’s such a part of my life, my past, it’s like she’s permanently imprinted on my heart, seared into my fucking soul. Her words are on my skin and she has no idea. No fucking clue. I sat across from her and smiled and nodded and gently teased her about her love for anything Katy Perry and I’m the ultimate liar.
Reaching out, I grip the steering wheel so tight my knuckles turn white. I grit my teeth, exhale through them, and stare out the window at nothing. My heart is thundering as though I just ran ten miles and no matter what I try to do, no matter how hard I try to forget, all I can think about is her.
Katie.
I’m sick of the lies I tell. My entire life is a lie. I need to do right by this girl, no matter how much it hurts me. I need to leave her alone. Never contact her again. It’s what’s best.
I’m obsessed, but I know better. I’m bad for her. I’ll ruin her. Because I’m just like him—and he will never let me forget it.
“I met a man.”
Dr. Harris glances up from the iPad where she takes her notes—I would never, ever want to see those notes about me, God no—and smiles faintly. “Did you now? Was that on your list of goals? Meeting a man?”
She sounds so neutral, like it’s no big deal that I met someone. When it was the absolute biggest deal ever for me.
Until it wasn’t—at least for him.
I nod, anger firing my blood as I launch into the entire story. How he saved me from the potential purse-snatchers, though I don’t mention where I went. Why I keep my visit to the amusement park a secret, I’m not sure, but I don’t really want a lecture about moving too fast. So I keep it to myself, burying yet another dirty little secret deep inside.
Stupid.
Dr. Harris remains quiet as I talk, eventually abandoning her tablet to concentrate solely on me. I pour out my heart, as hard as it is to do. I tell her how I felt instantly connected to Ethan as we talked over coffee, that he asked me to text him when I arrived home so he’d know I was safe and we exchanged cell numbers. That we even met for dinner.
How I haven’t heard from him since and it’s been over a week.
“You feel abandoned,” she states after I finish my story.
“Of course, I do.” I throw my hands up, giving her the universal duh expression. “For the first time in my adult life I show interest in a guy, actually go out on what I thought was a date with a man. I thought he liked me, too. He said he would call me. And he hasn’t.”
The pain from Ethan’s apparent rejection is almost unbearable and I hate that I’m so focused on it. I know it’s silly and I feel like a dumb teenage girl, but I thought . . . I truly thought he liked me.
Dr. Harris sets her iPad on a nearby table and folds her hands in her lap. “Who does Ethan remind you of?”
I frown. “What do you mean?”
“How he’s treating you. Does his behavior remind you of anyone?” She’s prodding. Fishing. I’m supposed to figure this out on my own because she’s already put it all together.
We’re quiet as I mull over her question. The minute it clicks, I don’t want to admit it. “My father,” I confess reluctantly.
“That you realize this so quickly is good,” she says, sounding pleased. “You’re making progress.”
Here we go. “I suppose.”
“Beyond his looks—he is handsome, I assume?” When I nod she continues. “What else attracted you to him? How he jumped in and protected you without hesitation?”
Yes. Absolutely. But that trait is nothing like my father, considering he did nothing to protect me after everything that happened.
“He became your hero. And I think you’d like one. You want a hero.”
I had a hero. My father was my hero throughout my childhood. For a very brief, very dark period of my life, Will Monroe became my hero. I craved his attention, so much that I think I drove him away. And now . . . what? Ethan is my new hero?
Ridiculous.
“I don’t want a hero,” I retort.
“But you like it when someone steps in and rescues you,” she points out, and I don’t deny it. I can’t. “Were you scared when those boys tried to take your purse?”
Terribly. All the fear had turned into something else when Ethan stepped in. Excitement. Arousal.
Shame washes over me. I don’t dare admit that. Do I?